Here’s what I don’t understand, though, and I’m hoping some of the smart people around here can explain it to me.

The government doesn’t really shut down. Some of it keeps going. I think they say “essential services” stay running, but a lot of government employees will be sent home, according to news reports:

If Congress fails to fund the federal government by Oct. 1, the start of the new fiscal year, the government will go into partial shutdown. Some government functions – those deemed essential – will continue as usual, while others will be suspended. If a shutdown proceeds the way it would have in 2011 (had the last funding impasse had not been resolved in time), 800,000 of 2.1 million federal employees would be furloughed.

And that’s what I don’t understand. Why is the government doing anything other than essential services in the first place? I mean, if it’s not essential, why is the government doing it?

That’s easy. Because people want you and me to pay for their stuff. It’s totally unreasonable to expect people who want things to actually go out and get a job and buy stuff, when they have the government spending other people’s money to give them things.

Now, the media is gonna play this whole thing as the mean ol’ Republicans — especially those influenced by the Evil Tea Party — not caring for women and babies and such.

But don’t blame the GOP. Or the TEA Party.

Blame me. I’d love to get credit for shutting down non-essential government services. So, if you’re one of those leeches that live off the government and you’re impacted by the shutdown of non-essential services, maybe you’re non-essential.

So go make yourself essential, grow up, and become a productive member of society.

Or be your normal self. As long as the non-essential services aren’t supplying non-essential people with non-essentials, I’m good with it.

With all due respect, I suggest that Harvey is missing all the nuances of this Genius of Geniuses. It’s not an abandonment of math. It’s a whole new math. It’s the magical math that is ObamaMath.

Here’s how it works.

As Harvey noted, you take a total deficit of $16,699,396,000,000. Next, you increase that by $97,594,000,000. What is the new total deficit? I best you said $16,796,990,000,000. But, guess what? You’d be wrong. It’s $16,699,396,000,000.

How is that possible? ObamaMath!

That’s the same way you can have health insurance costs go up, but still be paying less. Sure, you bank account looks smaller, your take-home pay looks smaller. But that’s because you don’t apply ObamaMath.

A smaller bank balance is actually a raise in pay. And you can thank Obama for that. Well, Obama and his wonderful, magical ObamaMath.

Gas gone up to nearly twice what it was when Obama took office? Well, not really. It’s actually less. That’s because $1.869 ÷ 2 = $3.539. ObamaMath!

And, here’s a secret that many people don’t know: you too can use ObamaMath.

Walk into a grocery store, fill your shopping cart with food, give the clerk a dollar, and walk out. It’ll be okay. Just explain it’s ObamaMath.

Was doing laundry Sunday. Of course, that meant a trip to the laundromat, which meant … Laundromat People.

Now, I fully realize that I’m now one of the Laundromat People, but that just makes me more qualified than others to comment on them.

Let me set the stage. The TV is on De Pelicula, and it’s showing a movie featuring masked Mexican wrestlers, girls in short shorts, and double-south-of-the-border rejects from The Final Sacrifice — complete with hockey hair.

Then, there’s the the kid on a leash running around. Little girl, three years old maybe, that was there with two women (possibly a mother and grandmother, but not sure). This isn’t a debate about putting kids on a leash. I’ll let Erick Erickson deal with that. No, I want to use the kid to make a point.

Now, if you weren’t paying attention, let me say the key part of this again: there’s a kid on a leash running around.

Think about that. If she’s on a leash, how is she running around? No, she’s not dragging the leash behind her. There’s a hand firmly attached to the leash.

No, she’s not leading the mother around. She’s carrying her own leash.

And that’s the problem with the government. We know it needs a leash, but we let it carry its own leash. And, it runs wild.

So, what do we do about it? The government, I mean. Do we grab the leash and hope it doesn’t bite us? (Think: IRS.)

Do we try to cage it?

What do we do about it? ‘Cause I got the feeling it’s sizing us up for something a little more restrictive than a leash.

I really don’t want to be one to pile on the Post Office. I know some people that work for the Post Office, and the ones I know are good people. And, at the Post Offices nearest where I work — the one in downtown Columbus and the one just across the river in Phenix City — the people there seem to be good folks. Of course, those have jobs where they deal with the public on a regular basis, so you’d think they’d be good at that kind of stuff. The ones I encounter are.

However, the people that I know well, that work the grunt positions behind the scenes, tell the story you’d expect. It’s a government bureaucracy that fails to reward good work and fails to punish bad work. Everybody gets a participation trophy.

Now, these aren’t people telling stories of how they, themselves, were passed over for promotion or recognition. Rather, they speak of others with whom they work that do great work, but are overlooked. They also speak of the stereotypical lazy government worker that others have to cover for, not to keep the other worker out of trouble, but so that Jane and John Public gets their mail.

I suppose they could let the job go undone, but they aren’t that kind of person. They care about their job, and care that the customer get the best service possible.

Only, it’s not always possible. Mail gets delivered late, workers work overtime, all because the system won’t get rid of sorry people. Add that to the typical government mindset that the job doesn’t matter as long as all the forms are filled out, and you have a very inefficient system.

“Given that only 15 percent of you turn to government assistance in tough times, we want to make sure you know about benefits that could help you,” USA.gov announced today. The ”government made easy’ website has created a “help for difficult financial times” page for people to learn more about the programs.

Now, just maybe, what they’re saying is true. That is, 15% turn to government during “tough times.” So, what about the other 35%?

They were at the government teat all along.

Now you know why Obama’s approval rating will never get below 40%. You got at least 35% that believe in letting everybody else take care of them. Throw in in the fact that most of the news polls are weighted nearly +10 Democrats, plus the crazy statistic that over 95% of blacks like Obama despite the fact that black unemployment is way up under his term, and there’s no way that his poll numbers will drop very far.

And, if the government can get more sucking on its teat…

Sigh.

150 years ago, Democrats were using guns to keep people in physical chains. Today, they’re handing out your money to get people to voluntarily put on financial chains.

The Department of Homeland Security tweeted on Monday how dangerous it can be to fry a turkey.

And, in case you thought that someone left their computer unlocked and somebody tweeted it as a joke, they also put up a blog post about it.

The Department of Homeland Security, that great arm of Big Brother, knows that Islamic terrorists aren’t so much of a threat. Sure, they want to kill us, but that’s our fault. Just ask Ron Paul.

After flirting with the idea that right wingers were a threat — not because of things they’ve done, but because there’s the possibility that some right-winger might do something… Left-wing violence was never an issue. Sure, they’ve been shooting Congresswomen and crashing planes into buildings and raping hippies, but that’s actual violence. The real threat has always been potential violence. Since the left has actual violence, and the right has potential violence, the right must be a bigger threat.

Until now.

As DHS has so kindly informed us, the real threat is dead turkeys. They’re evil. So evil, that after they’re dead and frozen, they’ll still try to burn down your house.

So, as we approach Thanksgiving, be thankful that we have a government department that wants to protect us from turkeys.

Now, if we can only find someone to protect us from the turkeys at DHS.

“National parks, national forests and the Smithsonian Institution would all be closed. The NIH Clinical Center will not take new patients, and no new clinical trials will start,” he added in a roll call of expected agency closings.

But the air traffic control system would stay up and running, the emergency management agency would still respond to natural disasters and border security would not be affected.

…John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal employee union… (said) “Employees are apparently going to be told to report to work Monday (then) they will be released, and those who are nonessential, nonexempt will be released and the other ones will be told to stay.”

What’s all this mean?

It means that those of us on the right were right all along. The government is full of people whose jobs aren’t necessary. And they don’t even know who they are.

There are too many non-essentials when the economy is good and the government isn’t running a deficit. It’s even worse during this Obama economy.

There’s word that some military might not get paid. Which means what? That the Obama administration considers them non-essential? That sounds like a bunch of stupid liberals. Gotta fund those abortion clinics, but not so much the American soldier.

The military is one of the essentials. But there are plenty of non-essentials in the government today.

Now, I don’t think that non-essentials are necessarily a bad thing. I’m sitting at a computer right now. Not the cheapest computer, either. I spent around $3,000 for this MacBook Pro. That’s a lot of money. And, I could have made do with a $400 Dell, I suppose.

And, looking around the room, I see a fish tank. We don’t eat the fish, so it’s non-essential. There are some trinkets on the coffee table and shelves. Some plastic flowers. A Rubik’s Cube (what’s that doing on the coffee table?). Candles. A scratching post for the cat.

Non-essentials.

In tough times, we wouldn’t have all them.

And that’s what the government is full of: non-essentials.

Lots of people who work for the government are trinkets and plastic flowers. Some are smelly candles.

The military is more like the doors, walls, shotguns, and such: they protect us and keep us safe. Not a whole lot of smelly candles and plastic flowers there.

For the U.S. to come out ahead on this, they need to send the non-essentials home. And leave them there. Let the non-essentials get a real job.

Oh, sure, there are lots of people out of work right now. Non-essentials.

I’m not saying they aren’t qualified. I’m saying their job wasn’t needed when they lost it.

I don’t mind so much when business hires non-essentials. They are in the business to make money. And, when they make money, they have more money to spend on the non-essential jobs. Which, after a while of being done exceptionally, gets more focus and becomes essential.

The government, not so much. The business world is hurting because it has to cut non-essentials while the government keeps the plastic flowers and scratching posts on the payroll.

The government should get rid of all those smelly candles and plastic flowers. Then, they wouldn’t spend so much money.

And you could have more smelly candles, plastic flowers, and scratching posts.

Drudge is reporting that DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano wants you to report on other people.

If George W. Bush had said this, the left would be all up in arms. But, since one of Obama’s incompetents made the suggestion, it’s okay with the left. But we on the right are getting our panties in a wad about it.

Should we?

Heck, I don’t know. Because Big Sis launched the campaign at … Walmart.

The “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign—originally implemented by New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority and funded, in part, by $13 million from DHS’ Transit Security Grant Program—is a simple and effective program to engage the public and key frontline employees to identify and report indicators of terrorism, crime and other threats to the proper transportation and law enforcement authorities.

More than 230 Walmart stores nationwide launched the “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign today, with a total of 588 Walmart stores in 27 states joining in the coming weeks. A short video message, available here, will play at select checkout locations to remind shoppers to contact local law enforcement to report suspicious activity.

You see the problem I have with this, right?

Not that Big Sis wants us to report each other. It’s that they’re asking for suspicious activity at Walmart.

I wonder has she ever been to a Walmart? I was at one the other day, and saw Elvis:

Someone else saw him, too, but in California. On the same day, no less.

But, then, it is a Walmart. Where you can find people like this:

And this:

And this:

And this:

Okay, that’s enough. It’s more than enough. You can see more, if you like.

Anyway, what I’m wondering is, are we supposed to report suspicious people we see at Walmart? And, what’s the criteria for “suspicious” at Walmart? Looking normal?

If I was looking for suspicious people to report, I wouldn’t need to go to a Walmart to find some. There’s this person. And this one.

But, until he does another lolbama post (mid-December), if you have some to submit, send them to me at lol@basilsblog.net. I’ll post them, or some of them, or all of them, next week. Or tomorrow. Or when I feel like it.

Whether or not Einstein said it, it’s true that doing the same thing over and over expecting different results is a definition of insanity. Keep that in mind…

So many problems are created by government. Not that government is a bad thing; it’s not. But out-of-control government is a very bad thing.

The bailouts — first begun when Bush was president, but under the direction of a Democrat Congress — were something I opposed when they were proposed.

The bank failure was caused by government. And the bailout was government getting more involved.

Think about this: if you put a bunch of monkeys in a room and let them run loose, and they caused damage to the walls and furniture, would you then give those same monkeys hammers, nails, and paint, asking them to fix things?

No, you’d remove the monkeys and deal with the consequences. It might be a rough time for a bit, what with all the mess the monkeys made, in addition to all the collateral damage that will result. But that’s what you’d do.

Of course, it was your fault for putting the monkeys in charge to start with.

In case you missed it, them monkeys? Democrats. Keep that in mind in November.

One question: If the government came to you and said, “Professor Krugman, you have a car. We’re going to compel you to buy a more expensive car, but it’s not really more expensive because it’s a better car.” Wouldn’t you tell them to get off your land?

It’s a document that guarantees our liberties. It lays out the duties and responsibilities of the three branches of our federal government, and it establishes the relationship between the states. And, as amended, it establishes the rights guaranteed to the individuals on which the government may not infringe.

I am of the camp that feels that not enough people have read the Constitution — including many who have sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution.

At the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention, delegate Benjamin Franklin (the dude on the $100 bill, for you on the left) was asked, “What have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”

The government has taken over the auto industry, banking, and is looking to take over health care.

But has the government done enough?

I don’t think they have. The government needs to do more. Just like there are people in this country who don’t have health care, there are people in this country who are going hungry.

Sure, there are food stamps. But there’s Medicare and Medicaid for health care assistance, but that’s not enough. Just like we need the government to take over health care, we need the government to take over the food industry.

We need to raise taxes to pay for a “public option” for restaurants.

My vision is for the Obama King restaurant to offer healthy choices for your dining experience. Like tofu. And salads. Lots and lots of salads. And no fried foods. Certainly no meat. A complete vegan menu, consisting of … plant parts.

But do call ahead to avoid the lines. It’ll take a year or two for McDonald’s, Hardee’s, Wendy’s, and all the little Mom and Pop restaurants to go out of business as people move to the public option. But, soon enough, the Obama King restaurants will be everywhere. Sure, you might have to wait a while, even if you call ahead. That is, after you are placed on hold for an hour or two, but your call will be answered in the order in which it was received.

Speaking of phones, it would be bad for you to have a cell phone when there are plenty of others who don’t have a cell phone. We need a public option. The government can provide cellular service. O-Mobile would be available to everyone.

But cell phones aren’t the only technology area where Americans have a gap. Not everyone has a computer. Sure, lots do, but many Americans don’t have a computer. And the government can help, by offering a public option. After a while, there will be no more PCs or Macs. No debate between Windows, OS X, or Linux. Most Americans will own government computers that run one OS: O-S (the Obama System).

However, having a government issued computer doesn’t mean as much if you don’t have Internet access. AT&T, Knology, MediaCom, and the other ISPs don’t get the job done. Many people don’t have Internet access. A government-run public option would solve that. ObamaNet would allow everyone to be on the Internet.

There are just a few of the many, many ways the government can solve your problems by taking control of your life.

I mean, if you were really competent to do things for yourself, you wouldn’t have elected Obama and the Democrats to power, would you?

My fears are now allayed: I’m thrilled to hear that government-run health care will be as efficient as the post office. And that’s according to the president.

Your hard-earned money will be collected from your paycheck via taxes, and sent to finance a program that will be run like the post office.

Let me say that I have a brother-in-law that works for the post office. He’s a good guy. And most of the postal workers I’ve met are good people, too. I say that so they won’t … well … go postal on me.

Anyway, the president has convinced me. We need to have government-run health care. And the post office example sold me.

But, there are some of you, I’m sure, that aren’t yet convinced. So, as a loyal American (who doesn’t what to be flagged), I present other reasons to let the government run health care. Here are things that will present excellent examples of how government-run organizations (regardless of the level of government) operate:

Amtrak

The quality of public schools

The NEA funding of porn

The DMV

Oil for Food

Paying farmers to not grow crops

Student visas

The TSA

FEMA

The IRS

If these examples don’t show you just how wonderful a government-run health care system will be, I don’t know what will convince you.

If you know someone who opposes health care, whether it’s speaking out against the president’s proposal at the water cooler at work, or writing dissent on a blog, send us an email to flag@whitehouse.gov … and we’ll flag them!

Later, we’ll expand the program to accepting emails to flag people about all kinds of things. When we’re done, we’ll have flags for:

Opposing government health care

Disagreeing with judicial appointments

Protesting tax increases

Speaking out against government takeovers of other industries

Voicing opposition to Obama’s initiatives

Think bad thoughts

Sound like fun? Of course it does! It’s F-U-N! Fun!

At the new Six Flags over America program, you’ll be able to flag all your co-workers, neighbors, family members … anyone who doesn’t support the party line.

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